Plastic does not pose a threat to the marine environment and the health of people; It endangers the basic human rights. This is the framework used by an increasing number of legal experts, policy makers and environmental groups in talks on the proposed United Nations Treaty “to end plastic pollution”, which is under the risk of another round of negotiations this week in Geneva.
the Treaty draft The negotiators began to work last week, mentioning human rights at least twice. But the text did not go far enough, according to legal experts, and now, in the second part of the fifth round of the treaties of the treaty – which extends from 5 to 14 August – there was a Business between civil society Some negotiators to put a stronger focus on human rights in order to justify specific policies, such as reducing global plastic production.
It was not until recently that experts began referring to the plastic problem explicitly in terms of human rights. It was the initial turning point 2021 report The United Nations special course on toxins and human rights, Marcus Aurelana. Over the course of 24 pages, Aurelana described how plastic materials threaten human rights at each stage of her life, from extracting oil and gas to production, use and disposal – to a large extent through the pollution of chemicals and microscopic tiles on a large scale.
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Orlena wrote, the situation has become very bad, that “the ability of future generations to enjoy an overpowered environment leads to life with dignity now.” He urged politicians to “reverse the plastic crisis” to protect human rights.
under International human rights agreementsMost countries have a legal commitment to protecting the basic rights of their inhabitants in life and health and a “appropriate standard of living”. The question is not if it is To defend these rights, but how this is done – which is usually done by chest in the most specific empowerment rights, such as drinking water cleaning rights, nutritional food, decisively, which is a clean and healthy environment, is not excessively contaminated with plastic.
This relationship was confirmed between plastic pollution and human rights indirectly last month in A. Prominent By the International Court of Justice, which ruled that “under international law, the human right is in a clean, health and sustainable environment necessary to enjoy other human rights.” The decision specifically indicates the effects of climate change, but legal experts say it applies to plastic as well. Plastic garbage in the ocean, for example, harms fish groups, and thus It affects the right of the fishermen to “Fair and compatible” working conditions. and Chemicals Plastic version in the environment can enter the bodies of people without their knowledge, which affects The right to physical integrityAnd as well as them The right to reach Information About possible environmental pores.
One of Orellana’s recommendations for world leaders to negotiate a “law binding tool dealing with the full cycle of plastic” – the United Nations plastic treaty is currently working on. The member states have been working in the treaty since March 2022, and it has been supposed to have ended by the end of 2024. They are now aiming to complete it by the end of this week.
I told Orellana Grist that there are two wide ways that the treaty should merge human rights. First, it should explicitly call the term – including in its preamble, which puts the trend and background, in a separate article on the goal of the treaty, and in more specific articles on financing, chemicals and other topics. These articles, as Orlena claim, can defend certain rights, such as the right to information about toxic additives added to plastic and The right to benefit from science This is free from conflicting interests.
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Second, Olaya said, the treaty must implicit human rights principles, even in sections that do not use actual words “human rights”. For example, by supporting “”The pollter pays a principle– Which says that companies and countries are more responsible for plastic pollution should be required to pay for their cleaning – the treaty can support the right of people effectively. “treatment“When their other human rights are violated, a section of the agreement can be affected by a” fair transition “of job security for people whose ways of living may be affected by changes to international politics of plastic and recycling, thus supporting the human right to work under favorable conditions.
Most countries are already committed to supporting these rights, if they sign agreements such as the United Nations International Human Rights Bill. They mention them in the treaty is a way to remind politics of what they must do to support these current obligations.
In addition, Aurelana said, the treaty must lead to a decrease in plastic production; Directing it on recycling will not support human rights. Recycling is “Mirage”, as he told Grist. “It is paid by the interests of industry as a form of distraction and ending attention from real issues.” A A statement that he participated in last November He warned that negotiations were at risk of turning responsibility from countries that produce plastic to developing without “ability or resources to face the global plastic lesion.”
Last week, during the opening days of the current round of negotiations, many non -governmental observers confirmed Orellana invitation. In one of the events that celebrated the United Nations International Day of the World’s indigenous peoples on Saturday, members of the International Peoples’ Forum on plastic materials said that the treaty will fail in human rights if it does not specifically defend the rights of the indigenous population. In a separate event on Tuesday, American ethnic and environmental justice organizations including black women for wellness, free Detroit, and the community work network in Port Arthur raised between plastic production and the right to equality – petrochemical facilities are often more dense near black societies – and Reproductive freedomIncluding the right to have a child. Pregnant women He faced some of the greatest risks One of the chemicals related to plastic materials, which can harm their endocrine systems and Danger development Of their children. According to one of the studies published last year, a category of chemicals usually found in plastic food containers in 10 percent of the United States prematurely in 2018.
“All people from birth should have the right to have a child, not to have a child, complete physical independence, and raise children in a safe and healthy environment.” But plastic prevents them from fully enjoying these rights. She added: “Many parts of the plastic life cycle are direct or indirect violations of the framework of reproductive justice.”
The clockwise direction from the top of the left: a mark offered during an event honoring the original peoples in the world; Two speakers discuss the need to integrate the rights of the indigenous population into the treaty; Tianna Shaw-Wakeman (left) and Rijina Martin, a black women for wellness, discuss the effects of environmental justice on plastic and pollution production. Joseph Winters / Great
And only this Wednesday, a New study From the network of eliminating international pollutants, or iPen – a global alliance of environmental and health institutions – explicitly described exposure to plastic chemicals as the issue of human rights. The organization placed a wrist to detect chemicals on United Nations officials, delegates from Latin America and Europe, and waste workers, and found that everyone was at least 26 of the 73 plastic chemicals they tested, with more chemical exposure to waste workers.
“These chemicals invade our bodies, violate our right to a healthy environment,” read a statement from one of the study participants, Astrid Puentes Raño, the United Nations Special Rapporteur on Human Right to a clean, healthy and sustainable environment. “The industries must be responsible for the damage caused by their products, and more strong frameworks are needed to stop and address this pollution.”
The environmental groups also urged the bureaucrats responsible for plastic talks to support procedural human rights during the negotiations – that is, the right to do so Participate in making environmental decisionsWhich was devoted to regional treaties such as Arahus Agreement In Europe and Escazú agreement In Latin America. Darmesh Shah, a senior consultant activist of the Center for Non -Purprent Law of International Environmental Law, said that these rights are “essential” for the treaty and equitable plastic materials treaty, and to ensure this Environmental groupsAnd waste forums, and Native peoples I heard the sounds.
Since his 2021 report to the United Nations, Aureliana has said it was comfortable because of the increasing number of delegates who summon human rights concepts. But at the same time, the negotiating drafts produced by these delegates “have a long way after”, in part due to the fact that there is a lot of opposition from a small but sound minority from countries that drive to be the treaty “without teeth and very narrow.”
He refused to naming the countries, but said that they opposed the right to the right to a clean, healthy and sustainable environment, the right to science, “or human rights in general.” The group of countries associated with the opposition to reducing plastic production and controlling chemicals “” “A similar group of thinkingIt includes China, Iran, Kuwait, Russia and Saudi Arabia. Some of them summoned their right to “developmentAs a means of argument against restricting plastic production, and raising this right over other human rights.
“You cannot separate the right to development from rights to health, the right to live and the right to shelter,” said Shah, of the International Environmental Law Center. “The right to development can not be used as a Trump card to continue pollution.”